President Xi Jinping has pointed out that the issue of strategic perception is always the first button that must be fastened correctly in China‑US relations. This underscores the paramount importance of strategic perception for the bilateral relationship. As the saying goes, "Know yourself and know your enemy, and you will win every battle." In retrospect, the U.S. "engagement" strategy toward China was in fact built on a misperception of China's politics. Today, it is imperative for the Chinese side to gain a clear understanding of Western politics, especially that of the United States. A sound grasp of each other's political systems not only helps to understand mutual strategic perceptions but also clarifies certain judgments concerning China‑US relations. From the perspective of historical political science, China's and the United States' strategic perceptions of each other are both rooted in their respective political outlooks and their understandings of "international relations" as external politics. These political outlooks, in turn, directly stem from their historically distinct trajectories. Until the emergence of modern European nation‑states, Western history was essentially a social history—a history of intense competition and power struggles among highly pluralistic social forces. This historical context shaped political institutions (nation‑states and representative systems) characterized by competitive and adversarial resource allocation, which further gave rise to competitive and adversarial theories of historical politics—namely, multi‑party competition based on representative democracy. The global market, monopolized by first‑mover advantages, served as the guarantee for this competitive domestic resource allocation. In contrast, Chinese history has been underpinned by a unified national/political history since the Western Zhou Dynasty, a tradition firmly established by the Qin and Han dynasties. Since then, Chinese politics has centered on governance and winning popular support on the foundation of national unity. These divergent historical trajectories have forged fundamentally different political worldviews: the Western approach to political relations is inherently competition‑oriented, while the Chinese approach is inherently cooperation‑oriented. This is an unalterable historical law. 

As for the understanding of international relations as an outgrowth of politics, the respective political logics of China and the United States determine their distinct approaches to external relations. China's external relations are guided by the "all‑under‑heaven" worldview (Tianxia). The supreme goal of Confucian political thought is the ideal person who "cultivates himself, regulates his family, governs the state, and brings peace to the world." Ethical recognition between people constitutes the fundamental and logical starting point. The point of departure is an ethical identification with humanity based on the idea that "all within heaven are not outsiders." The process of external relations is primarily one of cultural identification, and the outcome is a peaceful and orderly world, namely the "theory of good governance." In contrast, the exclusive nation‑state, forged through the struggle of highly pluralistic social forces, serves as the Western starting point for external relations. Its political process resembles a quasi‑war state of power politics, and its outcome is an exclusive theory of empire.

The historically rooted differences in the political and worldviews of China and the United States determine the divergence in their strategic perceptions, which constitutes the starting point for understanding China‑US relations. The precipitous deterioration of China‑US relations can only be understood as a reaction of a competitive‑oriented political and worldview to changes in the structure of world politics. These worldviews also determine that a strengthening China represents a positive force for change in world politics, whereas the retreat of US‑led globalization runs counter to global progress. The implication is clear: the basic concepts of political science serve as the prerequisite for judging strategic and policy issues, and fundamental research in the social sciences is in itself high‑impact applied research.